Boring Portfolio Report
ANN ARBOR, Mich. (Dec. 19) -- As you undoubtedly know by now, the Dow scored
its second biggest point increase in history today, rising 127 points or
2.00% on the back of a favorable bond market and, so some say, short-covering
in advance to tomorrow's triple-witch Friday.
The S&P 500 came in just behind the DJIA, gaining 1.95%. The Nasdaq rose
11 points, or 0.82% ... and loping along in the rear was the Boring Portfolio,
which managed only a 0.28% gain in net value. That's better than a lump of
coal, I guess.
Interestingly (uh-oh, that word "interestingly" usually means something you
don't really want to know), only two of eight Boring stocks advanced on this
red-hot day in December, while five declined fractionally, and Borders held
fast at $34 5/8. Don't fret, Borders, I'm heading over there tomorrow to
take care of about 80% of my shopping list.
As I was saying, the bond market was rockin' today as the yield on the long
bond fell to 6.58%. How come? News of a narrower than expected U.S. trade
deficit and an advance in weekly jobless claims. Nothing like an increase
in joblessness just before Christmas to warm the hearts of bond traders,
I guess. In any event, that was sufficient to knock the snow off Green Tree.
GNT shot up $1 1/8 to close at $39.
The other Borefolio gainer today was Cisco Systems. CSCO rose a dollar to
close at a bid of $65. A flurry of press releases the past few days indicate
that folks at Cisco are advancing the state of the art in switching technology.
Cisco has just introduced its new Catalyst 1800 Token Ring switch. According
to the story from Cisco, the new switch is the first product to come out
of Cisco's recent acquisition of Nashoba Networks. Its features include "RMON
(Remote MONitoring), additional filtering, and CiscoView network management
support."
I have no idea what that means -- although I'll try to find out. If I've
deciphered the press release correctly, though, I infer that the product
is a fairly big-deal, high-end switch for providing backbone interconnections
and high-throughput uplinks. In other words, not something to hook up to
your Christmas tree lights. An 8-port Catalyst 1800 with RMON will have a
base cost of $9,995. Then there's a bunch of options you can hang on it --
4-port token-rings, FDDI modules, and so forth.
Late this afternoon, another press release announced that Cisco had signed
a technology transfer agreement with NHC Communications Inc. that will result
in NHC supplying "IEEE 802.5J Compliant Fiber Optic links to Cisco, for use
in the latest range of switching products marketed by the Cisco InterWorks
Business Unit." Hang in there -- this'll become slightly clearer in a moment.
NHC had been a partner with Nashoba prior to that company's acquisition by
Cisco and has been working to extend the interconnectivity range and performance
of Cisco's Catalyst switches. NHC specializes in fiber optic transmission
products and has been a major contributor to the development of (okay, here
it comes) "the IEEE 802,5J and 802.5C standards." Translation: NHC is a big
deal in developing high-speed fiber-optic technologies for telecommunications
and networking, and they are working with Cisco to incorporate some of their
knowledge into Cisco's products. The press release says that the first commercial
products resulting from all this activity "are expected to be available in
Spring 1997."
I don't know about you, but I can't wait.
Seriously, even though I'm grokking maybe 20% of this news, max, I really
will try to learn some more about it -- and pass it along when I do. Meantime,
if *you* know something about it, please drop me a note at [email protected].
If Cisco is involved in it, it's good stuff, of that I have no doubt.
Oh, yes. There was one last Cisco press release today -- and this one I
understand perfectly. Cisco employees in Chelmsford, Mass. donated more than
1,000 pounds of food and $42,000 in cash to Project Bread, a leading anti-hunger
organization in Massachusetts. The fundraiser was part of a company-wide
effort that netted more than one-million pounds of food or equivalent cash
donations from Cisco's offices in Massachusetts, North Carolina and California.
The donations from Chelmsford will be used to support soup kitchens, food
pantries, homeless shelters and other emergency feeding programs in
Massachusetts, according to Ellen Parker, executive director of Project Bread.
Cisco employees shoveled snow, set up a mock toll booth in the company parking
lot and 'jailed' fellow workers to raise the donations. On the last day of
the fundraiser, Cisco Chairman John Morgridge matched dollar-for-dollar all
employee cash donations for the day, raising the day's total to $20,000.
Some folks say that stuff like this distracts from maximizing the bottom
line and thus ends up short-changing shareholders. All I can say is that
this is one shareholder who doesn't feel he's being short-changed in the
least.
Thursday, December 19, 1996
Stock Change Bid
--------------------
BGP --- 34.63
CSL - 1/8 58.13
CSCO +1 65.00
GNT +1 1/8 39.00
ORCL - 1/8 42.13
OXHP - 1/8 58.63
PMSI - 1/4 11.50
SLR - 1/4 56.75
Day Month Year History
BORING +0.28% -3.06% 16.08% 16.08%
S&P 500 +1.95% -1.49% 19.97% 19.97%
NASDAQ +0.82% 0.25% 24.49% 24.49%
Rec'd # Security In At Now Change
2/28/96 200 Borders Gr 22.51 34.63 53.80%
2/2/96 200 Green Tree 30.39 39.00 28.34%
5/24/96 100 Oxford Hea 48.02 58.63 22.07%
6/26/96 100 Cisco Syst 53.90 65.00 20.59%
3/8/96 400 Prime Medi 10.07 11.50 14.22%
8/13/96 100 Carlisle C 52.65 58.13 10.40%
10/15/96 100 Solectron 54.52 56.75 4.08%
11/21/96 100 Oracle Cor 48.65 42.13 -13.41%
Rec'd # Security In At Value Change
2/28/96 200 Borders Gr 4502.49 6925.00 $2422.51
2/2/96 200 Green Tree 6077.49 7800.00 $1722.51
6/26/96 100 Cisco Syst 5389.99 6500.00 $1110.01
5/24/96 100 Oxford Hea 4802.49 5862.50 $1060.01
3/8/96 400 Prime Medi 4027.49 4600.00 $572.51
8/13/96 100 Carlisle C 5264.99 5812.50 $547.51
10/15/96 100 Solectron 5452.49 5675.00 $222.51
11/21/96 100 Oracle Cor 4864.99 4212.50 -$652.49
CASH $10651.57
TOTAL $58039.07
Transmitted: 12/19/96